Fraudster Sentenced in Manhattan Federal Court to 20 Years in Prison for Perpetrating Multi-Million-Dollar Advance-Fee Scheme and Bankruptcy Fraud

U.S. Attorney’s Office
October 22, 2010

Southern District of New York(212) 637-2600

PREET BHARARA, United States Attorney for the Southern
District of New York, announced that CLYDE "PETER" HALL was
sentenced today in Manhattan federal court to 20 years in prison
for defrauding investors of millions of dollars by fraudulently
promising them access to high-yield investment programs and bank
instruments with purported high rates of return. HALL, who
decades ago played football for the New York Giants, was also
sentenced on separate charges of bankruptcy fraud. The sentence
was imposed by U.S. District Judge RICHARD J. SULLIVAN.

Manhattan U.S. Attorney PREET BHARARA said: "Today’s
sentence reaffirms our commitment to prosecute anyone who targets
the innocent through advance-fee schemes or attempts to
manipulate the bankruptcy system to the disadvantage of the
unsuspecting. This office will continue to work with our law
enforcement partners to protect victims of fraud and intercept
those who would seek to perpetrate them."

According to the Indictment to which HALL pled guilty,
documents filed in this case, and statements made in court:

HALL held himself out as the "representative" or
"attorney-in-fact" of two purported business trusts and told his
victims that in exchange for upfront or advance fees he could
obtain various bank instruments worth hundreds of millions of
dollars which could be used as collateral for loans or to fund
trading in high yield investment programs.

Despite HALL’s promises to victims that the advance
fees were completely refundable, and that he had over a decade of
success promoting these investments, HALL used the advance fees
to pay personal and family expenses and for the benefit of his
co-conspirators. At the time of his arrest, HALL possessed fake
bank letters of credit or bank guarantees on paper bearing the
logos of well-known international banks, including UBS AG, ABNAMRO,
Citibank, J.P. Morgan Chase Bank, Bank of America, and
Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation.

In addition to the advance-fee scheme, HALL also
committed bankruptcy fraud. Specifically, In April 2003, HALL
and his wife ANNE TORSELIUS HALL signed a $5,800 per month,
one-year lease for an apartment occupying the top three floors of
a five-story brownstone building on Manhattan's Upper West Side.
In November 2003, the HALLs stopped paying rent to the owner of
the apartment (the "Owner") and refused to move out when the
lease expired in May 2004. Between August 2004 and December
2004, and after the Owner successfully obtained an order for the
HALLs' eviction, CLYDE HALL filed or caused to be filed a series
of last-minute bankruptcy petitions in U.S. Bankruptcy Court for
the Southern District of New York, which contained false
representations, for the purpose of halting the eviction
proceeding and allowing him to remain in the apartment without
paying rent.

The HALLs eventually moved out of the apartment in
early January 2004, and into a new, $9,500 per month apartment on
the Upper West Side. By that time, the HALLs owed the Owner
approximately $81,200 in rent, which they never paid. At the
same time, CLYDE HALL caused a total of approximately $78,000 to
be paid to his new landlord for alterations to the new apartment
and to pre-pay a significant amount of the rent.

HALL, 71, pled guilty to one count of conspiring to
commit wire fraud and five counts of substantive wire fraud on
April 20, 2009, in connection with the advance-fee scheme. On
November 4, 2009, HALL pled guilty to one count of conspiracy to
commit bankruptcy fraud. HALL's wife, ANNE TORSELIUS HALL, 45,
pled guilty on November 3, 2009, to a charge related to HALL's
bankruptcy fraud scheme and is scheduled to be sentenced on
November 3, 2010.

In addition to the prison term, Judge SULLIVAN
sentenced HALL to three years of supervised release and ordered
HALL to forfeit $4.275 million and to pay over to $1.9 million in
restitution.

During the sentencing proceeding, Judge SULLIVAN said
that HALL left a "wake of wreckage" and that he crafted the
sentence to "send a message about what will be tolerated and what
will not be tolerated."

Mr. BHARARA thanked the FBI, the IRS-CID, USPIS, the
Office of the U.S. Bankruptcy Trustee for the Southern District
of New York, and the U.S. Attorney’s Office Criminal
Investigators for their assistance in the case.

These cases were brought in coordination with President
BARACK OBAMA's Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force, on which
Mr. BHARARA serves as a Co-Chair of the Securities and
Commodities Fraud Working Group. President OBAMA established the
interagency Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force to wage an
aggressive, coordinated, and proactive effort to investigate and
prosecute financial crimes. The task force includes
representatives from a broad range of federal agencies,
regulatory authorities, inspectors general, and state and local
law enforcement who, working together, bring to bear a powerful
array of criminal and civil enforcement resources. The task
force is working to improve efforts across the federal executive
branch, and with state and local partners, to investigate and
prosecute significant financial crimes, ensure just and effective
punishment for those who perpetrate financial crimes, combat
discrimination in the lending and financial markets, and recover
proceeds for victims of financial crimes.

This case is being handled by the office’s Complex
Frauds Unit. Assistant U.S. Attorney THOMAS G. A. BROWN is in
charge of the prosecution.